Visual Imagery In Peter Goldsworthy's 'Maestro'

Essay
Peter Goldsworthy’s novel Maestro is substantially autobiographical. Through the development of the narrator Paul Crabbe from adolescence into maturity, Peter recalls aspects of his own experiences growing up in Darwin. Goldsworthy employs a musical style throughout the novel to engage the audience with visual imagery. The style features used to create characterisation and descriptive settings are all distinctively visual and help to shape the meaning of the text. Similarly Pablo Picasso used imagery to create meaning and shock viewers through his painting Guernica. The painting is Picasso’s protest against the massacre and suffering of innocent civilians during the bombing of the small town of Guernica by the Germans during the Spanish Civil War.
Goldsworthy paints a clear image of Paul’s piano teacher, Keller through strong descriptive language. Through the images it becomes evident that Keller who is a very cultured man with his choice of apparel; a ‘suit, white linen, freshly pressed’, that he does not belong in the boisterous Darwin. Goldsworthy does this by juxtaposing the environment of the Swan hotel that ‘was packed, the drinkers and their noise spilling... into the front garden’ with Keller’s room that was populated with two huge pianos.
The
Megan is Paul’s first love interest and it is clear to the reader that the romance is only one of lust. Megan is first introduced and arrestingly visualised and metamorphosed as a ‘haloed vision’. Rosie on the other hand isn’t described visually; instead she is described as an annoying aspect of Paul’s school day. He portrays her voice as being ‘high pitched, like an insect’. Here we are given the impression of Megan being an angel and Rosie a fly but Paul proves that he is maturing and picks Rosie over Megan who never develops but instead cultivates into the image of a sex